my unique live setup (dunno if ANYONE else does this)

[djaeke]

live performance eh?


this was 5 years ago.
back then people doing laptop performances left people wondering what kind of fucking magic they just performed, not "oh jeez, another ableton set"

i mean i dont wanna diss what you're doing, ableton+launchpad/apc is certainly one of the ways forward for dj'ing but it's just that: glorified dj'ing.

I see your point, but it's only a little valid. as in, I see what you mean in that advanced sets, even more so than ableton sets, have been going on for a while, but that's in less dance-y music. love drumcorps, he's one of my favorites, listen to him all the time BUT it's not very dance-able. I don't know of a way to integrate that kind of live performance into a dance set, ESPECIALLY on a budget. I love what deadmau5 does live, especially using some live synths on stage, and I'd love to do that, but I do not have the money to even buy that much hardware, or even think about how to haul it to all the gigs.

for a laptop and two cheap controllers, I'd say my idea (if it's even that new of an idea, that's why I was hoping to see if you guys knew anyone else who did this) is pretty cool. I'm sure someone with money for a bunch of stuff on stage can work on making it even cooler

and I know what you're about to say. "Squarepusher made his music and did shows with only a sampler and bass guitar for a while." well 1. again, that wouldn't go well with dubstep, or any of the main edm genres. great for idm (or whatever the fuck you call it) but not so much for edm. 2. not everyone is squarepusher.

I was kinda hoping to spend less time on this thread defending my setup that I worked very hard on and more time getting feedback, ideas, some artists who already do this to reference, maybe inspire some people to do similar things.

[djaeke]

back then people doing laptop performances left people wondering what kind of fucking magic they just performed, not "oh jeez, another ableton set"

by the way "oh jeez, another ableton set"? who has every said that? I don't see a MAJOR amount of people doing ableton sets...a more appropriate statement would be "oh jeez another traktor set" but even that would be a bit silly.

[mks]

"Oh geez, another mashup DJ"...

Just run di tune, seen?

[djaeke]

"Oh geez, another mashup DJ"...

Just run di tune, seen?

well then...name some mashup djs! besides 3LAU, I know him.

[djaeke]

(just gonna point out once more how few times [none] I mentioned the word "dj" in my original post. just saying.)

[Mad_EP]

live performance eh?


this was 5 years ago.
back then people doing laptop performances left people wondering what kind of fucking magic they just performed, not "oh jeez, another ableton set"

i mean i dont wanna diss what you're doing, ableton+launchpad/apc is certainly one of the ways forward for dj'ing but it's just that: glorified dj'ing.

hahahah... ummm... not to undress a magician's secrets... but...


1) you realize Aaron uses Ableton?

2) he also uses his triggers to look more amazing than they are. I remember asking him how he got a midi "turntable" to make Ableton rewind the sound like a turntable... cos Ableton doesn't do that.
... and he said - "i had that midi trigger a clip of an audio sample of a turntable rewind."

Do with that what you will.....

[djaeke]

live performance eh?


this was 5 years ago.
back then people doing laptop performances left people wondering what kind of fucking magic they just performed, not "oh jeez, another ableton set"

i mean i dont wanna diss what you're doing, ableton+launchpad/apc is certainly one of the ways forward for dj'ing but it's just that: glorified dj'ing.

hahahah... ummm... not to undress a magician's secrets... but...


1) you realize Aaron uses Ableton?

2) he also uses his triggers to look more amazing than they are. I remember asking him how he got a midi "turntable" to make Ableton rewind the sound like a turntable... cos Ableton doesn't do that.
... and he said - "i had that midi trigger a clip of an audio sample of a turntable rewind."

Do with that what you will.....

.....THIS ^^^^

[mks]

No, but you said live, which in the vernacular I know is short hand for Live PA which means all original material.

The mashup concepts that you were talking about has been going on for quite awhile.

I wasn't trying to call you out, hence my attempt at a sarcasm symbol. Just do your thing.

Though I have to be honest, if you do that kind of thing at a dance night, you would probably drive me off the dancefloor within minutes. For some performers, it gets to be too schizophrenic and too many micro edits with no respect to musical flow. If you can overcome that, then good for you. Plus if it's a more experimental music night that is not really meant for dancing, then that is usually a better venue for me to take in these kinds of sounds.

Have you ever heard of Negativeland? They are probably the first mashup band; they started back in the late '70's. Look them up.

[djaeke]

No, but you said live, which in the vernacular I know is short hand for Live PA which means all original material.

The mashup concepts that you were been talking about has been going on for quite awhile.

I wasn't trying to call you out, hence my attempt at a sarcasm symbol. Just do your thing.

Though I have to be honest, if you do that kind of thing at a dance night, you would probably drive me off the dancefloor within minutes. For some performers, it gets to be too schizophrenic and too many micro edits with no respect to musical flow. If you can overcome that, then good for you. Plus if it's a more experimental music night that is not really meant for dancing, then that is usually a better venue for me to take in these kinds of sounds.

Have you ever heard of Negativeland? They are probably the first mashup band; they started back in the late '70's. Look them up.

Thanks for the first actual reference to someone to look up, but in response to your longest paragraph there I have two points. first, earlier I said "I of course wouldn't do that in clubs. I've never actually done a DJ gig (being that I'm not a DJ), it's always as a performer, but if I did do a real DJ set I'd probably use a more traditional deck setup, stick to a genre, etc." second of all, that what makes it a challenge. I don't do micro edits, in fact, much of the time I'll completely leave the controller alone for 32 bars at a time (more if I'm lazy ). the whole skill of live mashups, or mashups in general, is making multiple tracks (up to 5 in my case), and making them sound like one, to the point where if you didn't know the tracks in the mashup, the only giveaway to it being more than one song would be that there's more than one vocalist (though sometimes you might have 1 or even 0 tracks with vocals in a mashup, so hopefully there'd be no giveaway whatsoever). you guys should really go listen to the 10 song in 10 minute mashup I submitted to that contest there, link in the original post. I'm pretty proud of it.

[mks]

I will concede to the fact that there is a fuzzy line there in regards to the use of the term live and if you can transcend just mashing up a bunch of tunes together into some sort of sonic collage or performance, then I would call it live just like that time I saw Negativeland perform live.

There could be an interesting discussion here actually, the intersects between art, music, performance etc. You will actually get loads of people on here saying that it is not art because it's simple and anyone could do it.

Or are you just another DJ/producer/performer/whatever that wants to mash up the Beatles over a Jay-Z beat?? (That is a really good idea actually! I need to do that.... )

Edit: wrote that before seeing your reply post, but it still kind of works.

[djaeke]

just to clarify, I'm not trying to be fucking girl talk here. I hate that guy (okay that might be extreme)

I think he overdoes it. putting 500 songs into one song is a neat idea but it sounds like shit to me.

[hasezwei]

live performance eh?


this was 5 years ago.
back then people doing laptop performances left people wondering what kind of fucking magic they just performed, not "oh jeez, another ableton set"

i mean i dont wanna diss what you're doing, ableton+launchpad/apc is certainly one of the ways forward for dj'ing but it's just that: glorified dj'ing.

hahahah... ummm... not to undress a magician's secrets... but...


1) you realize Aaron uses Ableton?

2) he also uses his triggers to look more amazing than they are. I remember asking him how he got a midi "turntable" to make Ableton rewind the sound like a turntable... cos Ableton doesn't do that.
... and he said - "i had that midi trigger a clip of an audio sample of a turntable rewind."

Do with that what you will.....

dont worry i know hes using ableton, but that's my point: he makes it look engaging. i mean the midi keyboards just play amen slices and the crossfader of his midi mixer fades between the regular drums and said amen slices which once i found out about it seemed kinda cheap at first but nah. i prefer this to the many acts i've seen (in multiple genres including dark/industrial techno, house, dubstep and even rock music) who get booked for a live performance and end up just triggering loops with their launchpads like i was able to do literally 1 minute after i opened the launchpad demo.

@OP: as stated before, i think what you're doing in terms of dj'ing/mashing up (the lines are getting blurred more and more, we're currently doing a lot of mashups in traktor via cue points for example) is pretty dope, but in my opinion its not live performance. unless you make it look like one, give the audience something to get excited about.
what people love to see is the relation between your movements and the sound they hear, be it playing a guitar or hammering on an mpc or twiddling knobs like you're the captain of a spaceship.

i know some people who scoff at dj's (vinyl or digital doesnt matter) dancing to the music they play and twisting eq's all the time but i personally find that way more engaging than someone looking at their screen doing stuff i can't see.

by the way, audio examples of what you do would be nice.

[baseband]

people limit themselves far too often ...







...understand your sound

[AxeD]

I use a box of dubplates and two turntables. Dunno if anyone else even does that, haha

Promoters should put 'live dj set' behind your name (I'm hating on Ableton sets here btw)

[phrex]

I use a box of dubplates and two turntables. Dunno if anyone else even does that, haha

i think i might know someone

[djaeke]

live performance eh?


this was 5 years ago.
back then people doing laptop performances left people wondering what kind of fucking magic they just performed, not "oh jeez, another ableton set"

i mean i dont wanna diss what you're doing, ableton+launchpad/apc is certainly one of the ways forward for dj'ing but it's just that: glorified dj'ing.

hahahah... ummm... not to undress a magician's secrets... but...


1) you realize Aaron uses Ableton?

2) he also uses his triggers to look more amazing than they are. I remember asking him how he got a midi "turntable" to make Ableton rewind the sound like a turntable... cos Ableton doesn't do that.
... and he said - "i had that midi trigger a clip of an audio sample of a turntable rewind."

Do with that what you will.....

dont worry i know hes using ableton, but that's my point: he makes it look engaging. i mean the midi keyboards just play amen slices and the crossfader of his midi mixer fades between the regular drums and said amen slices which once i found out about it seemed kinda cheap at first but nah. i prefer this to the many acts i've seen (in multiple genres including dark/industrial techno, house, dubstep and even rock music) who get booked for a live performance and end up just triggering loops with their launchpads like i was able to do literally 1 minute after i opened the launchpad demo.

@OP: as stated before, i think what you're doing in terms of dj'ing/mashing up (the lines are getting blurred more and more, we're currently doing a lot of mashups in traktor via cue points for example) is pretty dope, but in my opinion its not live performance. unless you make it look like one, give the audience something to get excited about.
what people love to see is the relation between your movements and the sound they hear, be it playing a guitar or hammering on an mpc or twiddling knobs like you're the captain of a spaceship.

i know some people who scoff at dj's (vinyl or digital doesnt matter) dancing to the music they play and twisting eq's all the time but i personally find that way more engaging than someone looking at their screen doing stuff i can't see.

by the way, audio examples of what you do would be nice.

first, I think I get what you're saying. I appreciate the compliment that you like what I'm doing, but the majoring on terminology confused me a bit

second, I got some live ideas:
live drum solo, eg, during a breakdown where there aren't drums, or during an original song where I can just remove the drums. dunno if I'd do full kit, you can do some sick stuff with just a snare if you know how
I got the instrumental for harder better faster stronger, I've been thinking of using a mic and doing the vocoder part myself. at least for the solo part in the second half of the song.
doing live synth and arps on top of tracks, especially during intros when it's something kind of minimal, to build in, when there's lots of room for it. I've been meaning to find an excuse to use my midi keyboad live anyway

third: OH MY GOD this is the third time I've mentioned it, the contest entry I linked to has 10 songs in 10 minutes, and it came out pretty well for that much stuff going on. I'd check that out for an audio example since that was in my ORIGINAL POST.

[djaeke]

I use a box of dubplates and two turntables. Dunno if anyone else even does that, haha

Promoters should put 'live dj set' behind your name (I'm hating on Ableton sets here btw)

it's funny because I didn't say I was a dj at any point hahaha
hahahaha
haha
ha

[djaeke]

people limit themselves far too often ...







...understand your sound

amen. I'd do that if I had the caaaash.

[baseband]

jeff mills throws a 909 jam in a dj set. that can be done with a cheap controller and factory sounds in ableton live. juan atkins gets his group together with live electronic sound. that requires a few people who are capable of playing the same tempo. carl craig plays live synth pads over a programmed bass line. can be done with cheap/free soft-synths. (i really should have put a video of mount kimbie up there, but it would have broken my detroit theme)

takes time&patience. drexciya was not built in a day

[Triphosphate]

OP have you seen beardyman perform? Now that is a live performance.

I'm anxiously anticipating performance mode for FL.